


Popcorn, films and Arcades

by Firecadet



Series: Firecadet Soft Wars stories [4]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Crack, Fluff, Fluff and Crack, Fluff and Humor, Gen, How to Train a Jedi, Humor, Soft Wars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:09:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26741146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Firecadet/pseuds/Firecadet
Summary: Maris Brood, Jedi Padawan, sneaks out of the Temple for a date.Set in the Soft-Wars-Verse, using characters borrowed with permission from Chess_Blackfyre
Relationships: CC-5052 | Bly & Maris Brood & Aayla Secura, CC-5052 | Bly/Aayla Secura
Series: Firecadet Soft Wars stories [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1986859
Comments: 5
Kudos: 56
Collections: Open Source Soft Wars





	Popcorn, films and Arcades

The operation had been weeks in the subtle planning. Each step had been rehearsed, whether or not her Master, or any of the clones, were aware of it. An active-camouflage parachute lifted from a dusty storeroom aboard the Liberty. A ‘city-lights’ pattern jumpsuit, and a matching helmet, bought aboard in separate requisitions, ordered from the GAR central system. A set of tools she’d been gifted by Fuse, while he was teaching her how to disarm Seppie ordnance.

Maris had smuggled the parachute and jump gear into the Jedi Temple, in a bag of laundry (who knew that Aayla needed that much washing bought back to the temple?). The first time she’d opened her bedroom window wide enough to jump through, a buzzer had sounded in her master’s study, and a forcefield had activated over the window. She’d managed to come up with an excuse that she thought had fooled her Master, however.

It had taken her hours of painstaking work, over the course of a week, to find the sensor, trace the wiring, and disable it without triggering a fault alert. Those hadn’t gone to her Master, but the sensors had always been re-wired when she came back from her classes (History of Interplanetary Trade… ugh). Finally, though, she’d knocked out the sensor, and it had stayed disabled for a solid week.

All of the other plans were in place. She’d managed to get some petty cash from her Master, to buy herself a few sundries, and had also, quietly, bought some cosmetics, and a perfume imported from Iridonia. Those were in a small pouch, strapped around her waist.

Checking her outfit, Maris smiled. While there was, perhaps, enough leather to raise Anakin Skywalker’s eyebrows, and her own master might have deemed the neckline a little drab, she looked like a normal, teenage Zabrak. It would also fit under the baggy jumpsuit, which was a definite plus. Rustic-looking brown leather trousers, coupled with a roughspun tunic, and finished with a leather waistcoat. For footwear, she’d chosen a pair of heavy, knee-high black leather boots, that, whatever else, were definitely practical enough to fight in.

She’d hit it off with Rael Averross’ padawan, Val Rene, while the 327th was helping the 224th clear up after a separatist assault on Kisya, a normally peaceful ecumenopolis in the Mid-Rim. The 224th normally specialised in operations in difficult terrain but had been the nearest unit able to respond to a Separatist landing.

When the 327th had arrived, a week later, the majority of the CIS force had already been driven out of the system, leaving isolated clusters of battle droids in the undercity. Master Averross, was, according to the rumours, slightly more of a maverick than Anakin Skywalker, and slightly more unorthodox than Master Vos.

When she’d arrived, rather than meditating, or being Jedi-like, Master Averross had been sitting at the bar in a cantina, next to his padawan. The briefing had consisted of Master Averross mostly passing helpful information, while also flirting with Aayla, which she’d mirrored back, to a limited extent, leaving Bly fuming silently inside his bucket. Val, a human, had been sipping something that Maris strongly suspected wasn’t a soft drink, in spite of the ice cream floating in it.

After that, the two padawans had been sent off to find something to do, which had, inevitably, when you put a pair of force-sensitive teenagers together without a plan, resulted in mayhem. They’d stumbled onto a meeting by an anti-Jedi extremist group while exploring in a secure part of the undercity, had to fight their way out, and then spent the next eight hours trying to make it back to the surface, dodging ambushes, battle droids, and on one occasion, a dwarf-spider droid.

After that experience, they’d become friends. Without either of them really intending it, that friendship had slowly migrated to something a little bit more intriguing, over the course of a few months of holocalls, chat messages and a couple more (slightly) less eventful meetups.

And now, they were going on a date. One of the holotheatres near the Temple was showing a new film about Revan, so Val had bought a couple of tickets for them, quietly.

When she and Val had returned from a previous excursion holding hands, Master Averross had smiled, while Aayla had practically flown into a rage. Maris had been grounded aboard the Liberty for the remainder of the layover, with instructions to meditate. An attempt to sneak off the ship in the middle of the night had been foiled by her Master, who had lain in wait for her in the shuttle bay, and, of all the indignities, thrown Maris into the brig for the remainder of their stay.

Curiously, her Master hadn’t challenged her about the fact they were still chatting.

Shaking her head, she climbed into her jumpsuit, before fastening the helmet in place. Val would be waiting with a rental airspeeder outside a diner half a mile from the temple, and about three hundred metres below her window. Strapping on both her primary and reserve chutes, Maris clambered out of her window, and jumped.

The brief period of freefall as she angled away from the temple was exhilarating, before she popped her chute about a hundred metres from the temple. Using the Force to weave through traffic, she dropped onto the walkway next to Val’s convertible airspeeder, and packed her chute, then clambered out of her jump suit and took the helmet off, before wrapping an arm around him and giving him a hug, before they climbed into the airspeeder.

The cruise was a chance to let her hair stream in the breeze, something she never got the chance to do in Aayla’s sensible, enclosed speeder. Weaving through the buildings, they soon dropped into a parking bay a short walk from the holotheatre. As soon as they were out of the speeder, the two linked hands, sharing a grin at the simple transgression.

Heading into the holotheatre, Maris looked over at the human. “Popcorn or pick-n-mix?” she asked.

“Why not both?” Val replied, pulling out a wallet that definitely contained a lot more money than a year of Maris’ Jedi Allowance would have covered.

“Where’d you get that?”

“Master Averross.”

“Is he going to complain?”

“Only if I come back with anything left in there.”

Val looked slightly more deeply into the wallet, before extracting a small foil-wrapped object.

Maris suddenly turned bright red. Val’s cheeks weren’t much less flushed. Glancing around hurriedly, Val rapidly floated the condom into a bin, before pulling Maris over to the pick-n-mix and handing her a large pot.

“I’ll start at the bottom; you start at the top.” He grinned. “Make sure to get plenty.”

Maris grinned back, before systematically shovelling assorted portions of pick-n-mix into her pot. By the time she’d finished, Val was already ordering them two large sodas, two boxes of popcorn that looked like they’d adequately supply an entire squad of clones, and a pair of hot dogs.

Glancing over briefly as the doors opened, Maris noticed a pair of slightly older teenagers, a Miralian and a Togruta, walking in, hands not-quite brushing. She looked away again, before she’d have to admit recognising them if asked. As Val crossed back over, Maris pretended not to notice the hipflask being used to add an amber fluid to Kal’s soda. She did give him a nod, though, when it tilted towards hers.

The film was, possibly, not a masterpiece of cinema, relying on copious amounts of pyrotechnics, special effects and action sequences. Maris snorted several times at particularly ridiculous lightsaber techniques, once nearly filling her sinus cavities with soda. Val had similar issues, as did the pair she’d noticed earlier, who’d, for some reason, selected a corner of the cinema with a broken lamp to watch the film from.

After the film, the pair headed for an attached arcade. Being Jedi made a lot of the games ridiculously simple, so they quickly gravitated towards a pod-racing simulator, with two replica cockpits, and that featured inertia generators to give the sense of g-forces. Several races later, Val bought some more drinks, and they switched to a rock-climbing simulator.

Finally, though, they had to head back. Both of them had classes in the morning.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

When she woke up the next day, back in her room at the Temple, Maris couldn’t contain her grin. She’d completely gotten away with it. Her master hadn’t been waiting for her, and the window had still been open when Val had briefly pulled up next to it, so she could jump across.

Breakfast was with Aayla alone. Bly, for various reasons, didn’t stay over in the Jedi Temple. Her master gave her a grin when she came through the door.

“So, how was it?” Aayla asked.

“How was what?” Maris almost squawked.

“Your date with Val.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Master. I haven’t seen him in person since you found us holding hands on Kesti.”

“Maris Brood…” Aayla said, firmly, making the Zabrak wince slightly. “If you’re going to lie to me, you need to make sure I might actually believe you. Now, your schedule won’t involve any more sessions on Interplanetary Trade today. First, I’ve got you an appointment with Major Dulak, and then you’ve got a refresher course on anti-handling devices with Fuse. After that, you’re going to kit up, and run quick laps of the hangar until Bly tells you you’re finished. Oh, and hold out your left arm.”

Heart sinking, Maris held out the requested limb, which Aayla promptly fastened a bracelet around. It flashed once, and then there was a click, and she felt electrodes pressing against the underside of her wrist.

“Master…”

“This is a Jedi Order tracking bracelet. It’s harmless, but it’ll tell me where you are for the rest of the time we’re on Coruscant. Don’t try to take it off, because I will know.”

Maris slunk out of their quarters, feeling deflated. About thirty seconds after she’d left, Bly walked out of Aayla’s bedroom.

“A little harsh, Cyar'ika.” Bly said, running a hand down the back of Aayla’s tchun, which coiled around it.

“She needs to learn, Bly. And I can’t teach her this.”

“You could give her a few pointers.” Bly pointed out. “More than you’ve already given her, of course.”

“I’m going to be interested to see how long it takes her to get out of that bracelet.” Aayla commented, leaning back against the clone. “It shouldn’t take her too long, given the job she did on her window sensor.”

Bly grinned. “Even Fuse was impressed by that. We kept putting in better sensors, as well, and she still bypassed the last one cleanly enough that we only knew about it because of the anti-handling sensor.”

“If she bypasses it and walks in without it on, she gets into even more trouble.”

“I thought that you didn’t want to teach her the sort of things Master Vos taught you.” Bly observed, idly, playing with the tip of her tchun.

“Bly, all I’m teaching her right now is how not to get thrown out of the Order. If I could tell she was up to something, monitor her, and know exactly what she did and where last night, so could a Jedi who is… less accepting of the idea of relationships within the Order.”

“Still, it’s not like you didn’t help her, is it?”

Aayla giggled. “Can I take any of your laundry to the temple with mine… Honestly… Master Vos would have ruined a date if I’d tried that gambit to smuggle something off a ship. And does she really think the requisitions for the skydiving gear went through unnoticed?”

Bly grinned, and Aayla grinned back.

“The time I’ll actually be worried, Cyare, is when she manages to sneak out without either of us realising she’s planning something.”

“When she does that, Bly, that’s when she gets a big steak with all the trimmings. Now… I don’t have anything scheduled today…”

The two disappeared back into her quarters, hand in hand, and closed the door behind them. A moment later, the telltales showing the locking mechanism was active winked on.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

When she got to the medbay on the Liberty, Galahad was waiting for her.

“Master Secura bought forward your scheduled medical.” Galahad said, holding out a cup of tea and a lollipop. “You know the drill.”

After a brief set of tests, including weight, height measurement, and body-fat percentages (the last of which made Galahad suck her teeth in a little, and assign her extra snacks), they moved on to a blood test. Maris winced as the hypospray took a sample, before Galahad ran it through a processor.

“It’s fascinating, really.” The medic observed, as the machine blooped and burbled. “You can tell so much from one of these tests, these days. You can even, or so I’m told, tell if someone’s had sex in the last three days. Obviously, I’d have to report that, if it was a Jedi. There are all sorts of other things you can tell as well. What someone had for breakfast, if they’ve been drinking enough, and what they’ve been drinking, and if they’ve been taking enough exercise.”

Maris listened intently, as the machine was used to tell her an astonishing number of things about her diet, general health, and recent activities.

Then it was onto the physical. Galahad nodded approvingly as she stepped off the treadmill.

“That was an extra three hundred yards, compared to your last physical.” She observed. “Keep training like you are, and you won’t have to worry about using the Force to run long distances.”

Maris grinned. “Master Secura has assigned me laps of the hangar, later.”

Galahad smiled back. “What for?”

“Sneaking out of the temple.”

Galahad grinned. “Don’t make a habit of it. Coruscant can get dangerous at times.”

As the Zabrak exited, Galahad turned to her comm, and sent a brief, text-only message via the GAR secure Intranet. ‘ _Maris showing no signs of activity. implant effective if activity had taken place. she knows about the testing machine as well.’_

Then she sat back, mission complete, and waited for the first clones of the day, suffering from mysterious injures, to arrive.

**Author's Note:**

> Came up with the idea, and decided it needed writing. Any feedback is welcomed.
> 
> Mandalorian:  
> Cyar'ika: Darling/Sweetheart  
> Cyare: Beloved
> 
> Twi'leki:  
> tchun: Left Lekku


End file.
